


In My Father's Garden

by Thimblerig



Series: Scenes From A War [9]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Introspection, Shooting Guns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-07-05 15:15:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15866238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thimblerig/pseuds/Thimblerig
Summary: When he is eight years old, Louis’s First Minister teaches him to shoot.





	In My Father's Garden

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Anathema Device (notowned)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/notowned/gifts).



> Special thanks to Anathema Device for the prompt "Aramis with his son, teaching him the sword, or how to shoot."

When he is eight years old, Louis’s First Minister teaches him to shoot.

It is not his birthday, or a saint’s day, or any occasion of state. Just, the lean and lanky minister striding along the corridor in his familiar brilliant blue with a bundle wrapped in grubby canvas in his arms, asking if perhaps His Majesty would like to learn a skill?

Louis almost wrinkles his nose and turns away - his free afternoons are rare and prized, why should he give this one up for study? But Minister d’Herblay has never steered him wrong in the past and hidden in the man’s dark eyes is the promise of something good, so he graciously bids his governess good day and trots after the man into a manicured, quiet garden with only one or two guards at a discreet distance.

It is a fowling piece inside the rough cloth - Louis remembers the name carefully - light but accurate, Minister d’Herblay says. It is plain steel and unadorned wood, glum as a crow among songbirds in the ornate setting of the Louvre, and smells strongly of oil. Louis loves it immediately.

He has to take it apart and clean it five times before he can shoot it! Five! “Look after your weapons and your weapons will look after you,” Minister d’Herblay tells him, “Apprentice.” He says it solemnly, but there is a crinkle around his eyes that Louis knows means he is smiling inside. Louis wrinkles his nose and the eye-crinkles deepen.

When he has raised the gun to his shoulder as the Minister directed, and directed the sights, and breathed in-and-out, and squeezed the trigger so that a great fizz of sparks comes out and the weapon kicks against him… Louis can see that the ball has clipped the inner ring of the target. He retains his composure as a King must, but he sneaks glances at his Minister and sees that the man is pleased.

“A promising start, Your Majesty,” the Minister says soberly, “but as we know, Patience...”

“... delivers Mastery,” Louis finishes. “Yes, yes.” Sometimes it feels like the Minister was never young and excitable, never dallied with a stray impulse to climb a tree or follow a grasshopper as it manoeuvred over a twig _just so._ To show that he is someone the Minister can respect, Louis reloads his fowling piece all by himself, remembering every single step in the right order. “We have all afternoon to practice in, do we not?”

“Indeed so, Your Majesty.” And his eyes crinkle again.

He is always very careful with Louis, very proper and polite as a good courtier should be.  _Minister d'Herblay,_ always, not the _Aramis_ Louis dimly remembers. He never uses his Company Face, though, when he smiles all big and glittering and everyone in the room turns towards him like flowers seeking the sun. If Louis were a different person he would not trust the Company Face _at all,_ because somehow it always means that people are going to end up doing what Minister d’Herblay wants, even if they had quite different ideas before they walked into the room. But then the Minister will look across the room at Maman, and they share a little nod, and Louis thinks it must be alright. He wants one of the Minister’s little nods, one day. Until then he will satisfy himself with eye crinkles and tiny smiles, and afternoons spent in the quiet, learning to shoot.

 

**

 

“My father was good with a gun, they say.”

After a considering pause, d’Herblay says, “His Late Majesty was very fond of hunting, yes.” A pause for breath, and, “His hair was dark and worn long. He had a great fondness for puns. He held my life in the hollow of his hand at one time.”

Louis’ eyes grow round. “Papa saved your life? Personally?”

The Minister smiles crookedly. “I would not be here today, if His Majesty had made different choices. I remember him in my prayers nightly.”

Already Louis is starting to forget, after two years - lakes, seas, oceans of time - what his father was like. Papa brought the pony, didn't he? And played fall-down games in the outer gardens and opened one eye and grinned at all the worried people because he liked to joke a lot? When he smiled he showed all his teeth, big and joyous, and once he carried Louis down the street among all the crowds and Maman wore her best blue and he was warm and solid and said, “Calm, Your Majesty, your people are watching...” That was Papa, surely?

Louis is so very glad the Minister remembers Papa in his prayers: it reminds him that he was real.

 

**

 

It is quite late when they have run out of balls to fire, the rotten-egg stink of the burnt powder clouding the pretty garden as evening begins to call on them like a late, welcome visitor and peacocks cry in the distance.

They clean the gun one last time, careful of their tools as the Minister has taught Louis to be careful with everything - careful and attentive and loving - and stand away so that the servants can take away the target.

Louis pretends to be very sleepy, then. Even though he is a big boy now he still uses the old ruse sometimes and Minister d’Herblay, clever as he is, still falls for it, clucking his tongue lightly and scooping him up in his strong arms, and taking him home to supper.

**Author's Note:**

> I shamelessly raided the "pretending to be asleep so dad will carry you" ruse from 2.02 An Ordinary Man


End file.
